Two Worth Your Lunch Money

Evil Nine ranks among the few DJ-and-producer teams even regular ol' music fans need to know. These innovative Brits specialize in "breakbeat," which is more syncopated and more wildly rhythmic than house or trance, allowing DJs fewer restrictions. The source material on this compilation ranges from Daft Punk and BodyRockers to Brit rock like Franz Ferdinand, Test Icicles, and Mystery Jets. Sure, you're essentially buying someone else's playlist, but Evil Nine has impeccable taste in party records.

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Johnny Cash, American V: A Hundred Highways

Recorded in bits and pieces from 2002 through the death of his wife, June Carter Cash, in May 2003, right up to his own final call five months later, A Hundred Highways is the fifth and perhaps most poignant of Cash's sessions with Rick Rubin. Cash's whole career revolved around songs of faith and fate--and truth. Here, one of music's truest voices rings as true as ever. On hymns like Bruce Springsteen's "Further On (Up the Road)" and his own "I Came to Believe," there's not just a sense of urgency, there's a sense of peace. This probably won't be the last we hear from Johnny Cash, but it should be. This is exactly how he deserves to be remembered.

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